On October 15th, the DMA opened Re-Seeing the Contemporary: Selected from the Collection which highlights 60 works of art mindfully culled from our contemporary collections. The curator of the exhibition, Dr. Jeffrey Grove, sheds some light on the compelling nuances and powerful juxtapositions contained within the installation.

What’s your favorite object or room in the exhibition? Why?

Among my favorite rooms is the “Minimalist” room with a great sculpture by Larry Bell, a painting and prints by Brice Marden, two paintings by Robert Mangold, Sol Lewitt prints, a massive David Novros painting, and a luminous sculpture by Robert Irwin. This installation contradicts the notion that so-called minimal works are somehow cold and hard. It is a sensuous, vibrant, and thrilling space to occupy.

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What is it about this exhibition of works that caused you to conceive of it in these groupings?

The installation was envisioned in a roughly chronological sequence, with a desire to have each gallery encompass either a span of time, reflect select movements, or explore ideas expressed in radically different ways over many decades. This allows for some unlikely pairings and eccentric passages that nonetheless help us see some of these works in a new or perhaps unexpected ways.

What were the challenges for this exhibition?

Editing! We have so much great material and there is always a temptation to want to “over share.” How do you pull back, keep the focus, and tell clear stories? That is one of the exciting challenges of being a curator.

Jeffrey Grove is the Hoffman Family Senior Curator of Contemporary Art at the Dallas Museum of Art.

To hear more from Dr. Grove on the exhibition, join us for his Gallery Talk on November 10th at 12:15p.m. See you there!

This month we spotlight Caroline and Robert Belanger, DMA members since 2004.

Tell us a little bit about yourselves and why you joined the DMA? The strength of the Dallas arts community is what independently brought both of us here. Caroline moved from Austin to help run Pan American Art Projects, a Latin-American art gallery. Rob relocated from Atlanta to work with Dr. Anne Bromberg in the curatorial department at the Dallas Museum of Art. We are now running our own art-consulting business, Belanger Art Methods, and we are proud to serve the arts community and to support the Museum as active members of the Junior Associates Circle.

What’s your favorite activity at the DMA and why? For us, it would have to be Curator’s Choice, the first Junior Associates Circle event of the year. It is always an exceptional opportunity to meet new members and to hear a curator speak about one of their favorite works of art in the Museum’s collections – right in the galleries. Not to mention that is the very event where we first met!

What is or was your favorite exhibition at the DMA and why? Caroline: In 2005, Dr. Dorothy Kosinski curated the exhibition Dialogues: Duchamp, Cornell, Johns, Rauschenberg,which revealed both the overt and covert dialogue and shared visual vocabulary evident in the work of these four modern and contemporary artists. Personally, as an art historian, I enjoyed how this exhibition investigated the exchange of philosophies and strategies throughout modernism from Dada and surrealism to pop art, and even found-object assemblage. Also, it was nice that the majority of the works in the show are in the DMA’s collections.

Rob: Charles Sheeler’s “Power” Series from 2006, curated by Dr. William Keyse Rudolph, is a great example of how small, intimate exhibitions can be among the most memorable. The exhibition focused on a series of six iconic paintings by Charles Sheeler, a self-proclaimed “precisionist” painter and founder of American modernism. The key to this exhibition was that it not only reunited all of the paintings for the first time in many years but also skillfully integrated numerous original photographic studies and archival materials into the gallery layout, offering an exceptional snapshot of the creative process from start to finish.

What is your typical day like? As art consultants, no day is really the same, but the one constant is that we are always problem-solving. For example, one day we will be curating, inventing mounts, and physically installing works of art on-site for a private collector. The next, we are in the office researching, designing, and editing an exhibition publication for a museum. The day after, we may be visiting a gallery to help a client buy or sell. Since we have a broad range of expertise, we get the chance to work on a lot of great projects with some really fascinating people.

What do Madeleine Albright, Frank Lloyd Wright, Sylvia Plath, and Conan O’Brien have in common? They all started on their career paths as interns, just as many museum curators and educators do. Internships offer invaluable opportunities to try a potential profession on for size; for those who wish to explore a career in museum work, internships provide a great way to gain firsthand experience and insights.

Leticia Salinas, 2009 - 2010 McDermott Intern for Family Experiences, leads a family workshop in the galleries.

Over one hundred people have participated in the Dallas Museum of Art’s McDermott Internship program since its inception, including many current DMA staff members as well as colleagues working at other institutions in Dallas, throughout Texas, and across the country. Each year, eight interns work closely with the Museum’s curators and educators on a variety of projects, including doing research for upcoming installations or exhibitions; writing labels, catalogue entries, and other materials; and developing and facilitating programs for Museum visitors of all ages.

The program was founded in honor of Eugene McDermott, who had a passion for learning and the arts, and the interns have the remarkable opportunity to visit with Margaret McDermott to inaugurate their internship year. Our current interns recently had lunch with Mrs. McDermott, and she encouraged them to “work hard, learn a lot, and have fun” during their nine months at the DMA and in Dallas.

Shannon Karol worked with Dr. Roslyn A. Walker, Senior Curator of the Arts of Africa, the Americas, and the Pacific and The Margaret McDermott Curator of African Art, as a McDermott Curatorial Intern in 2005–2006, and she returned to the DMA as Coordinator of Museum Visits in 2007. I asked Shannon about her experience as a McDermott Intern, and she said:

The best part of being a McDermott Intern is that you are truly a member of the DMA staff. Even though I was a Curatorial Intern, I was able to collaborate with staff members in the Collections and Education departments on projects and installations. I also love the sense of camaraderie that you feel as a McDermott Intern. My fellow interns from that year are still some of my closest friends!

Shannon leads a tour of "All the World's a Stage"

Logan Acton worked with the Teaching Programs staff last year as a McDermott Education Intern, and he accepted a permanent position as Assistant to the Director of Education this summer. Logan said, “As an intern, I was able to explore the Museum’s collections and share my growing knowledge of them, and particularly my passion for contemporary art, with students and other visitors.” You can read more from Shannon and Logan on the DMA Educator Blog.

Logan discusses contemporary art at a Teacher Workshop.

Eight new McDermott Interns began their nine-month tenure at the DMA in September, and they will all contribute to Uncrated in the months to come. We look forward to sharing their experiences and insights about life and work at the DMA. You can join the interns, along with other members of the DMA staff, to explore the Museum’s collections and exhibitions during weekly gallery talks on Wednesdays at 12:15 p.m.

Welcome to the 2010 - 2011 McDermott Interns!

Lisa Kays is the Manager of Adult Programming at the Dallas Museum of Art

On Saturday we were excited to launch Art in October in the Dallas Arts District with a free admission day of activities and even an exhibition sneak peek.

Art in October

There are so many wonderful cultural events happening every day in Dallas, and especially in the Arts District, that we need a month to celebrate them all! Here at the DMA we hosted a delegation from Dallas’s “Sister City,” Dijon, France–five Michelin-starred chefs and one sommelier–outside our Flora Street Entrance.

Chefs from Dijon shared some amazing dishes with visitors.

Some delicious French food prepared by our visiting chefs from Dijon.

For four hours they prepared and offered samples of food and wine from Burgundy, the land of The Mourners.

Visitors enjoying a free sneak peak at "The Mourners"

Inside, we had performances throughout the day, including spoken word pieces by Booker T. Washington students, flash mob dances, and an appearance by the Plano Senior High Chamber Singers in full medieval dress (see them again on the October 15 Late Night).

The Plano Senior High Chamber Singers

Masterpieces in the works at the Space Bar in C3

Your Museum staff happily joined in on the fun, even grabbing a few bites of escargot panini along with our more than 4,500 weekend visitors. We can’t wait for the rest of the Art in October celebration!

Amy Copeland is the Coordinator of the Museum’s Go van Gogh outreach program to local elementary schools and a frequent blogger on the DMA Educator Blog. She has graciously agreed to share some of her experiences with the new exhibition in our Center for Creative Connections, aka C3. Last Saturday, more than 3,000 visitors helped us celebrate the opening of Encountering Space in the completely reconfigured C3 on National Museum Day. Stop by during Art in October, a monthlong celebration of the Dallas Arts District, for a chance to experience Encountering Space for yourself.

And now, here’s Amy . . .

One of my favorite things to do is poke around the Museum when exhibitions are being installed. I like seeing the bare walls pre-installation, and then watching as they get painted, and the vitrines begin to appear in the galleries, and objects are brought into the space, bringing it to life. I usually only catch glimpses of this process, but I’ve had a fun last few weeks walking through the Center for Creative Connections every day during the construction of the new Encountering Space exhibition. (My office is at the back of the space–lucky me!)

Below are pictures from the installation and a few from the opening day celebration last Saturday. They show just a fraction of this incredibly dynamic space, so I hope you’ll come explore it for yourself.

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Amy Copeland is the Coordinator of the Dallas Museum Art’s Go van Gogh outreach program

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